The browser you are using is not supported by this website. All versions of Internet Explorer are no longer supported, either by us or Microsoft (read more here: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/windows/end-of-ie-support).

Please use a modern browser to fully experience our website, such as the newest versions of Edge, Chrome, Firefox or Safari etc.

Alf Hornborg

Alf Hornborg

Professor emeritus

Alf Hornborg

Toward an alternative dialogue between the social and natural sciences

Author

  • Johannes Persson
  • Alf Hornborg
  • Lennart Olsson
  • Henrik Thorén

Summary, in English

Interdisciplinary research within the field of sustainability studies often faces incompatible ontological assumptions deriving from natural and social sciences. The importance of this fact is often underrated and sometimes leads to the wrong strategies. We distinguish between two broad approaches in interdisciplinarity: unificationism and pluralism. Unificationism seeks unification and perceives disciplinary boundaries as conventional, representing no long-term obstacle to progress, whereas pluralism emphasizes more ephemeral and transient interdisciplinary connections and underscores the autonomy of the disciplines with respect to one another. Both approaches have their merits and pitfalls. Unification runs the risk of scientific imperialism, while pluralism can result in insurmountable barriers between disciplines. We made a comparison of eight distinct interdisciplinary attempts at integration of knowledge across social and natural sciences. The comparison was carried out as four pairwise comparisons: environmental economics versus ecological economics, environmental history versus historical ecology, resilience theory versus political ecology, and socio-biology versus actor-network theory. We conclude by showing that none of these prominent eight interdisciplinary fields in and of itself manages to provide, in a satisfactory way, such an integrated understanding of sustainability. We argue for pluralism and advocate complex ways of articulating divergent ontological assumptions. This is not equivalent to pursuing knowledge unification either through scientific imperialism or by catering to the requirements of narrow practical utility. It means prioritizing interdisciplinary integration by simultaneously acknowledging the role of societal and natural factors in accounting for sustainability issues.

Department/s

  • Theoretical Philosophy
  • VBE
  • Human Ecology
  • LUCSUS (Lund University Centre for Sustainability Studies)

Publishing year

2018-10-24

Language

English

Publication/Series

Ecology and Society

Volume

23

Issue

4

Document type

Journal article

Publisher

The Resilience Alliance

Topic

  • Social Sciences Interdisciplinary
  • Philosophy

Keywords

  • Interdisciplinarity
  • ontology
  • pluralism
  • Scientific imperialism
  • sustainability science
  • unificationism
  • Interdisciplinarity
  • ontology
  • Pluralism
  • Scientific imperialism
  • sustainability issues
  • unificationism
  • sustainability science

Status

Published

Project

  • LUCID - Lund University Centre of Excellence for Integration of Social and Natural Dimensions of Sustainability
  • Science and Proven Experience

Research group

  • VBE

ISBN/ISSN/Other

  • ISSN: 1708-3087